RIAA: STREAMING PUMPS LATIN MUSIC NUMBERS

A significant spike in paid subscriptions drove an 18% growth in the Latin music market in 2018, according to newly released statistics from the RIAA. Digital distributions are another story.

The U.S. Latin music business grew 18% in 2018 to $413m with streaming formats accounting for a whopping 93% of that total. Latin music constituted 4.2% of the $9.8b U.S. music business, a slight increase from 4% in 2017. It’s the second consecutive year of double digit growth.

Paid subscriptions at services such as Apple Music and Spotify Premium grew 48% to $239m. Revenues from on demand ad-supported services grew 34% to $91m. That represents nearly a quarter of total Latin music revenues, a significantly larger proportion than the 8% it contributed to the overall U.S. music market.

“Any conversation about the Latin music market starts with one word: streaming,” RIAA COO Michele Ballantyne said.

“Latin music’s transformation from a physical-based business to a streaming driven one is even faster than the overall U.S. music market’s turnaround. But there are inherent challenges for any market where fans have a heavier reliance on free, ad-supported services—an area that has not yet reached its full potential due to the efforts by some platforms to drive down the value of music.”

While streaming service revenues, in aggregate, were up grew 26%, Latin music revenues from digital and customized radio such as Pandora and SiriusXM, were down 29% to $54m. Digital download sales fell 23% to $20m and physical product brought in a mere $6m, a 63% drop from 2017.